Looking back at my essential question, I think I would change it to: “How can I understand the ways that children learn through observing dance classes?” While I initially had hoped to be a little more hands-on with the children, being able to watch the classes from an outside perspective has taught me a lot about the ways that children in a classroom setting thrive. Although I wanted to focus more on the dance aspect of my senior project, I was able to discover so much more about child psychology within the classroom which is something that I never knew that I would delve deeper into through my six weeks at the LREI lower school.

One challenge I faced was directing the students in an effective and less “orderly” way. With my five year old sister, I tend to use a stern voice or get her to do things by saying,  “If you don’t… you can’t…” While this does work with my sister, I know that it’s something I can’t do to the kids I’m teaching since I’m in a professional setting, not my home. Therefore, I’ve struggled with finding ways to get the kids to listen while still remaining calm and polite. One solution I found was the call and response. As a student who attended the lower school, I know that the teachers tend to use this strategy a lot, so it was already something that the kids were familiar with. In instances where the kids were chatting amongst themselves or weren’t listening to Deborah, I would do a sequence of claps that the kids would respond to, and to my surprise, they would all quiet down and have their focus set back to her.

Additionally, I learned the importance of time management. Since I didn’t have a set schedule besides Tuesdays and Thursdays, I had the freedom to choose when I wanted to work on my project while obtaining the five hour minimum. This meant that I had to be on top of when I was going to watch the ballets, learn the choreography, and take breaks in between without ending up procrastinating everything to the last minute. While I did enjoy these freedoms and responsibilities, I learned that I thrive better in a setting where I have an already established schedule that helps manage my time in a better way with set deadlines for me to follow.

In regards to the second part of my project which consisted of watching ballets/different dance pieces, and learning choreography, I was able to grow specifically in the way that I connected my emotion to the dance movements. In the past, I would tend to pick up the steps and only focus on remembering those moments since I was in a dance class where several eyes were on me. Now that I had the time and space to focus on myself without the pressure of others watching me, I would choose a story to tell through my dancing and embody the lyrics (when there were lyrics) so that whoever would see my dance would understand what I was trying to convey. 

While I don’t plan on being a teacher, I’ve learned several techniques from Deborah on how to work with younger children that I will take with me for my younger siblings and for the future. One example is the concept of saying an emotion out loud in order to embody that feeling. When all the kids were filled with energy, she asked them to repeat after her saying, “I am calm” as they closed their eyes. Although they weren’t actually calm, she had explained that saying these phrases out loud would help them shift their energy/emotions. In addition, Deborah helped me understand that an effective way to retain the kids’ focus when reading stories, for example, is to make them fill in the blank with one specific word. For example: we had read a book where the word “water” was often said. Therefore, whenever the word “water” was mentioned, Deborah would pause and make the kids say “water” out loud instead of her saying it. This technique made sure that the children were listening closely to make sure they didn’t miss their key to say the word. 

One unexpected thing I got out of teaching was forming relationships with the students. I still remember the first day that I had come to teach, all the kids had waved and said hi as they entered the classroom. In particular, there was one Kindergarten student named Olivia who was very enthusiastic about me helping teach Deborah. While I only came in twice a week, I felt happy and grateful that I could bring joy and be a role model for the kids in the classroom to look up to.